What doesn't kill you can disable you for life

[ikariloona]

I remember years ago about some drill sargent or whatever telling recruits that pain is weakness leaving the body. Sounds like bullshit if the concept of crippling injuries means anything to you.

Still, for years the concept has floated around in my mind that you can only overcome your limits if you actually touch them - often enough to push them

Comments

[daiphoenix]

Hum, I would say I do have a moderate tolerance to pain (that got tested sometimes when I did martial arts several years ago). One could probably train or adapt the body to endure more pain, but that could be unwise: pain is there for a reason, it means something is doing harm to your body. That would probably the most problematic or worrisome for me: what the long term effects of whatever is happening to the body, rather than the pain itself.

[ikariloona]

I'd risk saying that in training your body to resist pain, you're also (or actually) training it to resist/minimize the effect of whatever causes the pain in the first place, therefore the pain isn't as intense as a consequence.
Probably depends a lot on the type of "potential injury", I figure...

I make a considerable distinction between "feeling" (discomfort) and actual "pain", and I'd bet the "border" between those can be pushed further to a certain extent, but "measuring" that point (the limit that must be touched before it can be crossed) and handling it well are likely the tricky parts...

[daiphoenix]

Yeah, it depends on the injury for sure. I don't think you can train your body to resist the pain of getting punched in the face repeatedly... :P (if you can, I wouldn't mind knowing how :) )